


Fond memories of Elliott Witt

by MoonTearChild



Category: Apex Legends (Video Games)
Genre: Elliott's brothers, Established Relationship, Headcanon, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Scars, are they dead? who knows, family troubles, it's sad, octane isn't good at comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-19
Updated: 2019-09-19
Packaged: 2020-10-24 09:30:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20703749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MoonTearChild/pseuds/MoonTearChild
Summary: A lazy day in bed leads to some rather unexpected stories, the origin of Mirage's nose scar, and Octane finding out a lot more than he previously knew about the Witt family.





	Fond memories of Elliott Witt

The light is warm as it filters through the window, gentle midday sun soothing all it touched. Elliott scrunches up his face with a groan, slinging his arm over his eyes to block out the light. A yawn escapes his lips as he lies there, simply taking in the feeling of the blanket slung across his hips and the warm body at his side. Life was good. Humming lazily, he debates whether or not to go back to sleep when he feels the covers shift and a mouth pressing to the side of his neck. Mirage moans.  
"Morning, baby."  
From the corner of his eye, Octavio shoots him a cheeky grin, wrapping an arm around his waist and settling his head on the trickster's chest.  
"Sleep well?" His voice is slurred from just waking up, and he traces obscure patterns into Mirage's ribs, making him laugh and squirm at the feather light touches.  
"Mhm. Damn, that tickles."  
The trickster realises his mistake the second Octane's eyes light up, and before he can protest, he's being pinned into the mattress by a metal leg slung over his waist, the junkie's hands attacking the man's sides relentlessly. Mirage shrieks, unable to stop the laughter from tumbling from his lips as he tries to worm away to no avail. He slaps his palms against the bed, trying to suck up air in between laughs.  
"Mercy! Mercy!" He chokes out, breathing a strained sigh of relief when the hands remove themselves, instead opting to help prop the man up and cup Mirage's jaw. Octavio leans down, pressing a hot kiss to his boyfriend's lips which he returned eagerly, holding onto the speedster's waist. They part for air.  
"Aw, Elliott, you're no fun." Octane pouts, mischief glimmering in his eyes.  
"I was wrongfully attacked! And plus, I didn't know you had your legs on! You're not supposed to sleep wearing them, you know this." His tone turns stricter, but Octane knows it's out of love.  
"Si, madre, but I needed to piss in the middle of the night and was too lazy to take them back off." He offers a sheepish smile, Elliott putting in response.  
"You're lucky you're cute." He huffed, pressing a kiss to the end of the junkie's nose. "You could have kicked me."  
It was pretty common in the nights where Octane forgot to take his prosthetics off for Elliott to wake up with a few new bruises scattered about his legs by morning. Octane was twitchy even in his sleep, often sprawling out and rolling about the bed as he rested.  
"Wouldn't be the first time, eh?" He teased, remembering back to the moment they had first met, where he had kicked Elliott in the face - repeatedly.  
Mirage let out a faux dreamy sigh.  
"And then you called me perfect, I was smitten." 

Octane snorts out a laugh, tracing his fingers across the trickster's cheekbone.  
"And you agreed. But still, that was bruised for weeks after, I actually felt guilty."  
"I think it made me look handsome, battle scars are cool." Mirage grins, making Octane shake his head.  
"And then you came and found me afterwards, and you apologised."  
Elliott's face flushed as he stuttered out a response.  
"I was nervous! It's not often I flirt for real." He tries to defend, Octavio's lips quirking up in a smile.  
"Cute. But still, I'm glad it didn't scar. I would've felt bad for ruining such a pretty face."

Elliott scratches at his beard absent-mindedly, humming in thought.  
"But I've already got some, what would a few more matter?" He shrugs as best he can with Octavio's weight on him. Mirage shudders slightly as Octane traces a finger over his left brow, caressing a small scar there with interest.  
"You never told me how you got this."  
He looks into the others eyes, slightly shocked.  
"I didn't?" He laughs. "Oh, man, is it a story."  
"Oh yeah?" Octavio asks, intrigued. "C'mon, don't make it sound all dramatic then not tell me." He whines, making the trickster grin.  
"All right, all right." He clears his throat dramatically. "So, I had just opened the bar. Barely been at it a few weeks, maybe a month? I'd had a bartending job before, when I was in school, but I'd just gotten out of working with my mom - I need to call her soon, actually, I-"  
"Elliott, c'mon amor, focus!" Octane huffs.  
"Oh, right." Shooting the junkie an apologetic look, he continues. "Anyways, so I'm serving people, already built up quite the reputation for a good drink at a decent price, was chatting to this cute girl, things were good. Then, as I'm refilling her drink - on the house like the gentleman I am - boom! One of the guys sat at the booth in the corner comes stumbling over, pulling up a stool at the bar and nearly falling off the damn thing. So he's drooling at this girl and I can tell she's uncomfortable, when all of a sudden he yells out 'hey baby, you got a banging set of tits!'. Bearing in mind she's like, three feet away."  
His face sours, clearly remembering the man with disdain.  
"Sounds like an asshole."  
"Oh believe me, he was. So I lean on the bar and I'm like 'hey buddy, perhaps you shouldn't treat the lady like that.' and he looks back at me and spits, right on the bar top in front of me. 'And why don't you mind your own damn business, barkeep. Gimme another drink.' So I'm fed up with this guy's shit at this point, and he's really pi-pissing me off, so I tell him he needs to leave. Of course, he's not too happy, and starts yelling shit, and just as I go to yell back- BAM!" 

The sudden shift in tone of Elliott's voice makes Octavio jump slightly, looking up at his lover's face in awe.  
"What?"  
"The fucker glasses me! Straight shot to the side of the temple. And I tell you, those bottles are tough, so that shit hurt - bad." He winces at the memory of it, pressing his fingers to the wound as if it were fresh. "So I'm falling back, luckily I hit the wall. I've got blood pouring into my eye, it's swollen shut, pretty sure I got glass stuck in my skin, it's a mess. And this lady, she's screaming, she's freaked the fuck out, y'know? And my head's hurting real bad, but I push up and hop the bar before the guy can do anything, and I got him by the fuckin' throat, and I just start wailing on him, punching him in the face until he looks just as messed up as I do - he was barely standing as it is but now, I throw him out the open doors, 'get a fuckin cab! And don't come back!' I yell. And everybody in the bar just starts cheering, it's so god damn loud, but I feel on top of the world."  
Elliott is smiling now, triumphantly at the thought of his heroic deed.  
"And what happened after that?" Octavio gasps, intrigued.  
"Well, turns out getting hit that hard isn't good for you. I got to the hospital and found out I had conca- cunc-"  
"Concussion?"  
"Yeah, that. And I had to get stitches on the cut. It was pretty deep. It ended up fine, had to close up for a few days to sleep it off, but it wasn't all bad." He smirks. "I got her number."  
Octane laughs.  
"Of course you did. Was she as pretty as me?" He asks, sticking out his tongue to show off the tongue bar there with a grin.  
"Not by a long shot, babe." Elliott pressed a chaste kiss to the top of the junkie's head, running a hand down his back. Octavio let's out a satisfied hum, leaning back in to kiss at the plush lips of his lover.  
"Well, I know if I ever get into a bar fight I can rely on you." He teases, making Mirage crack a smile.  
"Better not be starting any fights in my bar."  
"Or what, you'll throw me out?"  
They both laugh. 

"What about this one?" Octane asks, brushing his fingers across the more prominent discoloured skin across the bridge of his nose. Mirage's jovial smile falls. "Elliott? Are you okay?"  
The trickster sucks in a shuddering breath.  
"I-"  
"You don't have to talk if you don't feel comfortable-" Mirage cuts him off forcefully.  
"No!" He shakes his head, taking hold of Octane's hands. "I… I want to. You deserve to know, Tav."  
The room falls silent, and Octane simply waits, stroking a hand reassuringly down his bicep.  
Mirage wets his lips, closing his eyes. "Uh, funnily enough," his voice is hoarse, "this one also takes place in a bar."  
"Take your time, amor. Feel free to stop if you need."  
"I'm fine." He grits his teeth, spitting the words out harshly before flinching. "Sorry. It's just… It's a painful memory." Mirage shakes his head, conflicted. "No, it's not. It's a good memory. It just hurts to think about it."  
Octane wasn't sure what to say. He had never been good at sympathy, instead opting to keep his distance away from all the uncomfortable emotions he wasn't ever taught to understand.  
"I'm here, Elliott." He soothes, running a hand through the trickster's messy curls, still untamed from waking up.  
"Thank you, Tav." He sighs. "I know I've never really talked about my brothers, but I feel like I should, like…" he stutters as he begins to choke up. "Like I can with you."  
'Oh', Octane thought, 'this is what this is about.' 

He never knew much about them, other than rumours from the press and fans. Elliott had been scarce to talk about them, and when the rumour had resurfaced that his brothers were killed in the wars, Elliott was unlike anything Octavio had seen before.  
"They're not dead!" He screamed, throwing his data tablet at the wall. "They're not dead. They're missing. Not dead."

"It was my birthday. My eighteenth. Uh, I was- am, I am the youngest of four so, things were always a bit rowdy. Anyways, my brothers decided it would be a good idea to take me out on the town. Dylan - he's the oldest - " A bitter smile curls his lips, as if the very memory of him was tainted by his loss. "said he'd found a place that wasn't too expensive so we all headed out, made sure mom was asleep before we left and got a cab into the centre of Solace. I was so excited, all the bright lights and loud noises." He laughs, but it holds no joy. "We grew up pretty far out of the city, so I never really got to see much of the place, other than when mom dragged me out shopping. Sometimes, Dylan would come home with a paycheck and he'd take me out to this little arcade-" Tears flow down his cheeks as he sniffs, wiping them away with the back of his hand. "We'd spend hours there. He won me this cheap old stuffed animal once, I've still got it." Noticing he'd strayed from his original point, he shook his head. "Sorry. So, we get to this bar, and I can hardly believe it when the guy looks at my ID and lets me in, I mean, I'm legit but it all feels so unreal. Jack finds us a table while Josh gets some drinks - they were twins, y'know? Identical. Like me and my decoys, couldn't tell the difference. I think that's why mom gets so upset me using them around her, it reminds her too much of them…" He clears his throat. "And Josh, he comes back with these four glasses with little cups in them? And he sets them down and Jack laughs at me, says I have to drink it all down in one go 'like a big boy' - worst drink I've ever had in my life but I did it, and coughed for a good minute after. But, Jack, he was always the goofball. I think maybe I learned it from him, I looked up to him so damn much, I wanted to be just like him when I was older, which really got me into a lot of trouble at times."  
Octane notices his smile is slowly transforming into a genuine one. "Josh was always the smart one, he was in college. He always made top of the class and I thought he was so boring at the time but he always gave the best advice and would take the blame when I did something stupid. He was never apart from Jack, every time they could be together they were." 

Mirage wipes at his eyes again, coughing as if to hide his embarrassment. "So we drank, and it was crazy. I'd never had alcohol before, and I was trying to keep up with them. Naturally I was pretty drunk by the time I'd reached my third drink, but Dylan had gone up for another round. I remember it so clearly, Jack had me in a headlock, he was messing up my hair and I was trying to act mad about it. Josh was laughing along, when he just sort of stopped, and when we looked up, there was this guy holding Dylan by the collar. Turns out as he'd turned around with the drinks, he'd bumped into the other guy and spilled them all down his shirt. And out of nowhere, he just socks him. Dylan always was one who got into a lot of fights, especially when he was younger. He had a bad temper, but he was such a laid back guy, it's strange. Anyways, the guy hit back, and Dylan got it in the cheek, his lip was cut and before I even knew what I was doing, I was stumbling up to do something stupid. I hadn't even gotten the words out of my mouth when the guy hit me, slammed his face straight into mine and broke my nose. I didn't remember too much of it, must've blacked out or something, because when I came to the blood was pouring down my face and we were getting kicked out of the bar. Turns out Dylan had put the guy's head through the table just for touching me, all before the twins could even move a muscle." Elliott snorts. "I cried." His hand ruffles at his hair as he gulps down an oncoming sob. "I think it was all a bit to much, what with the drinks and the fact I'd never been hit before. So I was sat there on the curb with snot and blood all over my face, and Josh just hugs me - tight. He apologised for 'the worst night of my life' but then, through it all, I started laughing. I think he actually got worried I had brain damage or something, but I was just glad everyone was okay." 

Mirage wipes at his nose with the back of his hand, rubbing at his eyes. "We didn't have enough money for a cab back. So we walked. By the time we all got home it was four in the morning and our legs were killing us. I remember walking through the door, and feeling my heart hit my throat when I saw mom just waiting there, sat in the living room for us. I thought she would've been mad, and I could just tell we were all thinking of excuses, but-" he pauses, sobbing and trying to regain control of his breathing. "She just laughed." Wiping his eyes was futile at this point, but he still tried with shaking hands to occupy himself as he tried to continue. "She saw us, tired, practically sober at this point, me and Dylan beat up, and just - stood up and laughed."  
Octane lays a reassuring hand on Mirage's shoulder. "I remember, she hugged us so tightly. She just kept saying how happy she was we were safe. She- She-"  
"They sound like good people." Octane says softly. When Elliott regains his composure, he speaks.  
"They are. Were. I dunno. My mom, she helped reset my nose, patched me up. I remember it hurt so badly but… I was so proud. I had a battlescar. My brothers all told me they were jealous, acted like it was the coolest thing in the world as if Dylan didn't have ten of his own but… It made me feel good. I've always looked up to my brothers, I'd do anything for their approval, do anything for them to be proud of me."

Setting a hand on the man's jaw, Octavio looks into his eyes.  
"Elliott, they are proud of you. I know it."  
Mirage's dark eyes refill with tears.  
"You think so?" His voice is tired, hoarse from the sadness and the talking but Octavio finds it endearing how much his lover has been through.  
"Of course. And I'm proud of you too. I always will be." He pulls the man into his embrace, rubbing soothing circles into his back as he cried. When Elliott regained his composure, he sighed.  
"Thank you Tav, for listening. And for being here for me. I know it's not easy-"  
"El, shush. Of course, I'll be here for however long you need me. Te amo."  
Elliott presses his forehead against Octavio's, holding him close.  
"I love you too." He replies softly. 

They stay close together for another few minutes, basking in the moment of tenderness they shared before Elliott shifted uncomfortably. "I uh, should really call my mom. Before I forget." He smiles sheepishly, looking exhausted but satisfied, as if a weight had been removed from him. Octavio nods, pressing a kiss to Elliott's temple before moving off his lap, stretching.  
"I'll go make us some breakfast."


End file.
